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you think the media in your country influences popular perception about the US, and how that jives with your own personal experiences.

I also found it quite disconcerting the militarist culture that seems to be tied inextricably to Americans' conception of 'patriotism' (which is just as jarring; flags everywhere, the anthem being sung and the pledge being recited at the drop of a hat). That was another aspect of things that I didn't enjoy at all.

Man what. Where did you go?

This isn't exactly weird or anything. Watch some of that "patriotic" crap on TV sometime, closely. It's all soldiers with guns giving salutes and shit. While our society isn't completely focused on the military, it's certainly a strong point for a lot of patriotism.

It's true that US culture is tied inextricably with the military. Eisenhower warned against this, but even in his time it was already too late. With no major rivals left, our agenda turned towards maintaining hegemony and spreading our influence. It's not so much about free market capitalism or democracy as it is about domination. And there's nothing inherently shocking about that, since all superpowers throughout history have invariably sought to achieve this. What's more surprising is that we pretend we're doing otherwise for the sake of public and international support, since - respectively - there is still an enlightenment pretense to want to be all about equality and humanity and because we depend more on foreign capital than any historical equivalent.

A friend of mine spent some time in China, where her host family were a part of a pop culture (fairly common over there I understand) that loves any clothing with English writing. Sort of like how kanji is cool in certain circles here, except on a much broader scale.

Anyway, the host Mom was beaming with pride over a tie-dyed "Tripping is Fun" t-shirt she was wearing in honor of the American guest. She insisted that my friend translate it for her. Not recognizing the immediate need for tact, she told her in her best Chinese possible, that it says, "LSD is a good thing." And the Mom burst into sobs of shame.

A friend of mine spent some time in China, where her host family were a part of a pop culture (fairly common over there I understand) that loves any clothing with English writing. Sort of like how kanji is cool in certain circles here, except on a much broader scale.

Anyway, the host Mom was beaming with pride over a tie-dyed "Tripping is Fun" t-shirt she was wearing in honor of the American guest. She insisted that my friend translate it for her. Not recognizing the immediate need for tact, she told her in her best Chinese possible, that it says, "LSD is a good thing." And the Mom burst into sobs of shame.

Possibly the best story ever.

Bad English translations on Asian clothing are kind of a regular thing too.

I think your government sucks monkeyballs, but the people are fantastic. In fact, if I'll ever leave this country, I'll move to the US, just because I like the way people think.
...
Just as long as I don't have to deal with the government, healthcare or law enforcement. :| Oh, and for Pete's sake: you should *really* learn more about the rest of the world in school. D:

well, most americans think our government sucks monkeyballs. Government in kinda the parlementary version of the word. We got rid of a lot of them back in november, but unforutinately, we can't do it all in one wack.

I wouldn't worry too much about law enforcement over here. As much as we bitch about it, they arn't really that bad. At least as long as you're white or asian. Otherwise, be very very careful when reaching for your wallet.

you think the media in your country influences popular perception about the US, and how that jives with your own personal experiences.

I also found it quite disconcerting the militarist culture that seems to be tied inextricably to Americans' conception of 'patriotism' (which is just as jarring; flags everywhere, the anthem being sung and the pledge being recited at the drop of a hat). That was another aspect of things that I didn't enjoy at all.

Man what. Where did you go?

All down the West Coast. I've been to Washington state the most, but I've been all down through Oregon and California. Never been to LA, but I'm fairly certain I wouldn't like it very much anyway. I stayed in Santa Clara (or was it Santa Maria? Santa Ana? I don't know; Silicon Valley) for awhile, and I couldn't get over having a highway go through the middle of town and the utter lack of sidewalks everywhere. It was so surreal.

Not only that, there were billboards absolutely everywhere. Lots had military posters and, and I remember seeing images of war and the american flag dominating any other form of advertising.

This one trip, I went down to San Francisco and played in a music festival with a jazz band. Alcatraz was pretty cool, but everyone in that town were rude, and there were no buses to anywhere. We ended using this giant high school's auditorium for the festival, and I can clearly remember walking into this school in the morning and hearing everyone repeat the pledge of allegiance. It was surreal. I've never had to pledge allegiance to anyone or anything, including the Crown, and I mean not to.

The common thread among all these misconceptions seemed to be that my foreign friends were convinced that the American press was at least partially owned and operated by the Government, just like in their country. My roommate this past semester was from Hong Kong, and he refused to believe that it was even legal to criticize George Bush until he saw the Daily Show ("Oh my God, are they allowed to say that? Won't he go to jail now?").

If at all possible, send him a vid of when Colbert was at that dinner with Bush in the same room.

On that vein of criticizing the government, I heard somewhere that it was illegal to make fun of the government in Japan. Any truth to this?

I'm from Hong Kong, and your roommate sounds like a nutjob. Hong Kong has complete freedom of expression, and the right to organize large scale protests.
As for the Japan thing, no offense, but you sound pretty goddamn ignorant.

I can clearly remember walking into this school in the morning and hearing everyone repeat the pledge of allegiance. It was surreal. I've never had to pledge allegiance to anyone or anything, including the Crown, and I mean not to.

yeah, public schools are kinda required to do that every morning.

The kids themselfs arn't really forced to. They can, like I did, choose not to join in.

Hell, I will never swear(or pledge) to anything ever, and it is my right not to have to. "Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?" "nope."

I can clearly remember walking into this school in the morning and hearing everyone repeat the pledge of allegiance. It was surreal. I've never had to pledge allegiance to anyone or anything, including the Crown, and I mean not to.

yeah, public schools are kinda required to do that every morning.

The kids themselfs arn't really forced to. They can, like I did, choose not to join in.

Hell, I will never swear(or pledge) to anything ever, and it is my right not to have to. "Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?" "nope."

Ugh, to be raised in Texas. I never want to hear the phrase "Dishonor all who fought and died for that flag!" ever again. No one dies for a flag, you jackasses, or what it stands for. It's all kind of left over from the 50s, as I understand it.

I can clearly remember walking into this school in the morning and hearing everyone repeat the pledge of allegiance. It was surreal. I've never had to pledge allegiance to anyone or anything, including the Crown, and I mean not to.

yeah, public schools are kinda required to do that every morning.

The kids themselfs arn't really forced to. They can, like I did, choose not to join in.

Hell, I will never swear(or pledge) to anything ever, and it is my right not to have to. "Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?" "nope."

I can clearly remember walking into this school in the morning and hearing everyone repeat the pledge of allegiance. It was surreal. I've never had to pledge allegiance to anyone or anything, including the Crown, and I mean not to.

yeah, public schools are kinda required to do that every morning.

The kids themselfs arn't really forced to. They can, like I did, choose not to join in.

Hell, I will never swear(or pledge) to anything ever, and it is my right not to have to. "Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?" "nope."

I don't think everyone realizes this. I know I for one am forced to stand and do all that shit during the pledge at our school.

Coverage, at least from my experience, is intentionally critical of the US (i.e., "how does action [x] affect Canada?", rather than "the U.S. committed action [x] today").

I don't think that's true. I think they're delivering an in-depth, local perspective just like any self-respecting journalist would. It's just that there's not a whole lot of nice things an intelligent person can say about any of the Bush Administration's policies.

I think it's very true. The media here always gives every story a canada focus. Like with the new moon base thing or something... headline was something like:

"CANADA TO BE INVOLVED WITH MOONBASE"

When I read the actual article, only in the very last paragraph was canada mentioned, and it was along the lines of something like this:
"Canada may participate in the moonbase".

Before I went to France in October, I was told to expect the people there to be rude to me, especially when they found out I was American. But I never got that. Not once. In restaurants, they seemed to immediately know we were tourists, and spoke to us in english, even before we asked for a table.

Out in the countryside, those who didn't speak english were very polite about it, and we actually had some humerous moments with them because of the language barrier.

We did engage in an in-depth conversation with a world travelling woman who did our portrait. We did discuss some American traits and her visits to New York- we explained that it's different on the west coast and in between. She didn't have the hatred that most Americans assume foreigners have.

I haven't traveled abroad, but the people I know who have generally think that Europeans tend to be fairly polite, if not overtly friendly. Most of the Europeans I've known who visited the states, though, were complete fuckwads. Not all, but most.

Southern or Northern France?

I'm Canadian and they immediately treated us with hostility in Northern France.

Really? I usually get nothing less than the warmest hospitality from the French, regardless of what city I'm in.

Coverage, at least from my experience, is intentionally critical of the US (i.e., "how does action [x] affect Canada?", rather than "the U.S. committed action [x] today").

I don't think that's true. I think they're delivering an in-depth, local perspective just like any self-respecting journalist would. It's just that there's not a whole lot of nice things an intelligent person can say about any of the Bush Administration's policies.

I think it's very true. The media here always gives every story a canada focus. Like with the new moon base thing or something... headline was something like:

"CANADA TO BE INVOLVED WITH MOONBASE"

When I read the actual article, only in the very last paragraph was canada mentioned, and it was along the lines of something like this:
"Canada may participate in the moonbase".

Bias? hell yes.

Well, I think this is just an example of intelligent marketing. A headline promoting Canadian involvement in something is going to draw more people than not mentioning it. And they want the most people possible to pick up the paper, or click on the article online or whatever. Basically, mentioning Canada expands the potential pool of interested people beyond those interested in moon bases.

Also, I have no idea why the French would be hostile to Canadians. Something Quebec related I suppose.

I don't think everyone realizes this. I know I for one am forced to stand and do all that shit during the pledge at our school.

Talk about stupid fucking rules.

what is "all that shit"?

Being in texas, we have to say the american pledge, the texas one (this one is truly pointless, no one cares about it) and then have a minute of silence. All it really does is waste five minutes at the beginning of class.

EDIT: Oh, and they make me do the hand gestures, too. For the american, hand over the heart; for the texan, you stick your hand out like you were going to shake hands.

Yeah, nothing like giving up hundreds/thousands of years of history to "conform".

God I hate traditionalists. The old currencies are just that now, history. And only idiots believed the "convenience" explanation.

As for American perceptions, well I've got nothing against the actual people but certainly amongst my peers there's a strong, strong dislike for the American government (I personally hate the fuckers and everything they stand for) and a general perception that all Americans are stupid. I don't really subscribe to the latter, as a student of American Studies I know that there's a long and intellectually rich history, but I also know that the actions of the government over the past 200 years have generally been disgusting, and the only time it does anything good is when its people force it to.

The common thread among all these misconceptions seemed to be that my foreign friends were convinced that the American press was at least partially owned and operated by the Government, just like in their country. My roommate this past semester was from Hong Kong, and he refused to believe that it was even legal to criticize George Bush until he saw the Daily Show ("Oh my God, are they allowed to say that? Won't he go to jail now?").

If at all possible, send him a vid of when Colbert was at that dinner with Bush in the same room.

On that vein of criticizing the government, I heard somewhere that it was illegal to make fun of the government in Japan. Any truth to this?

I'm from Hong Kong, and your roommate sounds like a nutjob. Hong Kong has complete freedom of expression, and the right to organize large scale protests.
As for the Japan thing, no offense, but you sound pretty goddamn ignorant.

He was very proud of the fact that Hong Kong has a free press, but he still thought that the American press was run by the government, as did four of my other friends from Hong Kong.

As for the Japan thing, no offense, but you're a fucking tool. I've spent the last two years balls-deep in Japanese cultural studies and have many close Japanese friends, and even though I've still only scratched the surface I know enough to know what I'm talking about here. If you want to attack something I've said on the merits, feel free, but don't passive-aggressively accuse me of being racist. I do take offense to that.

EDIT: I do understand that I worded my initial statement poorly. I was already aware that Hong Kong has a free press, I just failed to disassociate HK from the rest of Asia and parts of Europe when I made my point. Mea culpa.

Zimmydoom, Zimmydoom
Flew away in a balloon
Had sex with polar bears
While sitting in a reclining chair
Now there are Zim-Bear hybrids
Running around and clawing eyelids
Watch out, a Zim-Bear is about to have sex with yooooooou!

Zimmydoom, Zimmydoom
Flew away in a balloon
Had sex with polar bears
While sitting in a reclining chair
Now there are Zim-Bear hybrids
Running around and clawing eyelids
Watch out, a Zim-Bear is about to have sex with yooooooou!

I don't think everyone realizes this. I know I for one am forced to stand and do all that shit during the pledge at our school.

Talk about stupid fucking rules.

what is "all that shit"?

Being in texas, we have to say the american pledge, the texas one (this one is truly pointless, no one cares about it) and then have a minute of silence. All it really does is waste five minutes at the beginning of class.

EDIT: Oh, and they make me do the hand gestures, too. For the american, hand over the heart; for the texan, you stick your hand out like you were going to shake hands.

They can't make you do that.

I am 100% sure of this. It is not unconstitutional for schools to do the Pledge of Allegiance, but because it includes the words "under God," they cannot require participation. Respectful silence maybe, but not participation.

I don't think everyone realizes this. I know I for one am forced to stand and do all that shit during the pledge at our school.

Talk about stupid fucking rules.

what is "all that shit"?

Being in texas, we have to say the american pledge, the texas one (this one is truly pointless, no one cares about it) and then have a minute of silence. All it really does is waste five minutes at the beginning of class.

EDIT: Oh, and they make me do the hand gestures, too. For the american, hand over the heart; for the texan, you stick your hand out like you were going to shake hands.

They can't make you do that.

I am 100% sure of this. It is not unconstitutional for schools to do the Pledge of Allegiance, but because it includes the words "under God," they cannot require participation. Respectful silence maybe, but not participation.

Yeah, I told them that when I said I didn't want to stand. Even though I was completely silent, I still got shit from the teacher. I just chalk it up to retarded teachers and don't waste energy fighting it. She already gives insanely hard grades with criteria we're never told, I don't want to put myself in a position for anything worse.

Oh, and I know I probably came off as a dick when I told her I didn't want to stand. It's all the more reason for me to shut the fuck up and do it, no matter how stupid it is.

I don't think everyone realizes this. I know I for one am forced to stand and do all that shit during the pledge at our school.

Talk about stupid fucking rules.

what is "all that shit"?

Being in texas, we have to say the american pledge, the texas one (this one is truly pointless, no one cares about it) and then have a minute of silence. All it really does is waste five minutes at the beginning of class.

EDIT: Oh, and they make me do the hand gestures, too. For the american, hand over the heart; for the texan, you stick your hand out like you were going to shake hands.

They can't make you do that.

I am 100% sure of this. It is not unconstitutional for schools to do the Pledge of Allegiance, but because it includes the words "under God," they cannot require participation. Respectful silence maybe, but not participation.

I can't speak from personal experience, never having lived anywhere near Texas, but I would guess that this particular region might be another place where the law is secondary to social pressure and expectations.

Christ, didn't we just have a thread about some town in Washington going apeshit because someone wanted to take their toy cannon away? What with the death threats and everything?

Zimmydoom, Zimmydoom
Flew away in a balloon
Had sex with polar bears
While sitting in a reclining chair
Now there are Zim-Bear hybrids
Running around and clawing eyelids
Watch out, a Zim-Bear is about to have sex with yooooooou!

I don't think everyone realizes this. I know I for one am forced to stand and do all that shit during the pledge at our school.

Talk about stupid fucking rules.

what is "all that shit"?

Being in texas, we have to say the american pledge, the texas one (this one is truly pointless, no one cares about it) and then have a minute of silence. All it really does is waste five minutes at the beginning of class.

EDIT: Oh, and they make me do the hand gestures, too. For the american, hand over the heart; for the texan, you stick your hand out like you were going to shake hands.

They can't make you do that.

I am 100% sure of this. It is not unconstitutional for schools to do the Pledge of Allegiance, but because it includes the words "under God," they cannot require participation. Respectful silence maybe, but not participation.

They can't legally make you do it. My dad didn't do it when he was a kid; they tried to fight him on it, but couldn't do squat.

I just wish he had told -me- that when I could still protest in a meaningful way.

I am 100% sure of this. It is not unconstitutional for schools to do the Pledge of Allegiance, but because it includes the words "under God," they cannot require participation. Respectful silence maybe, but not participation.

Well umm kids don't have the same constitutional rights as adults so I'm pretty sure you're wrong. My understanding of it is that they can't force you to say "under God" part but they can punish you for insubordination if you refuse to say the rest.

Edit: That is, the Supreme Court never ruled that it's "unconstitutional" although lesser courts have.

Yeah, nothing like giving up hundreds/thousands of years of history to "conform".

I don't really subscribe to the latter, as a student of American Studies I know that there's a long and intellectually rich history, but I also know that the actions of the government over the past 200 years have generally been disgusting, and the only time it does anything good is when its people force it to.

Man what redux. I'm the first to admit that the US has committed its fair share of atrocities in the last 200 years (the sticky native American business, dropping da bomb, Vietnam, the War in Iraq, so very many more), but I always thought of American intervention in Europe during WW1 and WW2, the emancipation proclamation, and putting men on the moon as pretty good things.

But I 'spect that someone will rip any shreds of patriotism left in me to pieces by quoting and summarily knocking down all of the points I just put down.

I think that going to Japan will give you a poor impression of others' internationalisation. I love living here, and will probably become a citizen some day, but SOME people (unfortunately, often the ones who speak English) have the most ridiculous ideas about the outside world. I hear/encounter something ridiculous about once a day. Also there are problems with people trying direct translation - the word 'gaijin' in Japanese, although it literally means 'foreigner', often connotes 'white westerner, probably American'. This leads to lots of dumbarse sentences like 'Foreigners like to eat a lot of meat'.

But keeping to the OP - I think a lot of intelligent, liberal, educated Americans have a problem with foreign perception of their country. Although I've never been to America, I've met a LOT of Americans (hell, my first girlfriend was American). The thing I've noticed is there is a MASSIVE range of behaviours present. I've met lots of funny, kind, interesting Americans. And I've met the most annoying goddamn arrogant dicks. Particularly some people don't understand that their culture is just that - American culture - and not some global standard that we should all aspire to.

It's unfortunately, also a country where people are often very ignorant about the outside world. Not as much as Japanese people (coz no-one in the developed world is). But pretty shocking. I've met Americans who think that the UK and EIRE are having a conventional land war, that the IRA is a conventional army, and Northern Ireland is the territory there are fighting for.

Basically there are lots and lots and lots of wonderful American people. I particularly admire people's optimism and energy (us English people are usually miserable, pessimistic buggers). But there are some REAL dicks who are giving you a bad name.
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